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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Second Session (51-2)
2008-06-18 Daily Xml
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RECYCLING

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (14:56): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Environment and Conservation a question about recycling.

Leave granted.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Recycling has long been demonstrated to be an effective means of reducing reliance on raw materials needed to produce resources like glass, paper and some metals. Recycling has also demonstrated fantastic energy savings through resource recovery and remanufacture. South Australians already embrace the need to recycle and have led the nation for many years, but we can do better. Will the minister update the council on South Australia's status as a recycler and indicate whether it is to improve the state's resource recovery?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Environment and Conservation, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister Assisting the Minister for Health) (14:57): It is true that South Australia enjoys an enviable reputation around the nation for its recycling efforts. Recycling is more than just a household task to South Australians: it is part of our state's psyche. For more than 30 years we have had an incentive to collect and return our drink containers. We have worked hard to be KESAB tidy town winners, and thousands around the state regularly embrace initiatives like Clean Up Australia Day. It is therefore pleasing that, despite our long commitment to recycling, as a state we have not waned in our dedication as recycling rates in South Australia continue to grow. Latest figures show that South Australians are among the best recyclers in the nation, having recycled more than 1,500 kilograms of waste per person in 2006-07.

To give members an idea of what we are talking about here, South Australians recycle 68 per cent of all waste generated, with 2.43 million tonnes of material being diverted from landfill in 2006-07, a 1.6 per cent increase on the previous year. That is a record of which all South Australians can be very proud. As the honourable member said in his question, recycling substantially improves our environment by saving energy, conserving resources and reducing extremely harmful greenhouse gas emissions. I understand that for every one tonne of green waste, such as household food waste or garden waste we divert from landfill into compost, we save one tonne of greenhouse gas production. So, it is a real environmental benefit. Last year alone through recycling South Australia prevented about 930,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas from entering the atmosphere, which is equivalent to taking 214,000 passenger cars off the road. Latest Zero Waste SA figures show that the amount of waste sent to landfill continues to fall and that it has been at its lowest level in the past four years of analysis, despite an increasing population.

It is encouraging to see that South Australia performs well in construction and demolition waste recycling, beverage container recycling and steel, and the proportion of plastics collected and processed within South Australia is among the highest nationally. Our state will not rest with these results, which is why we are pushing ahead with plans to increase container deposits to 10 cents and we are working to reduce kerbside recycling of kitchen waste.

Ten councils have now been selected for this six-month trial, which combines household kitchen food waste collection with green organic garden waste, which is collected kerbside and then passed on to be processed for compost. This will see 16,000 South Australian households taking part in the trial, which is a major step towards achieving our state's target to divert 75 per cent of waste from household waste bins collected kerbside by 2010. South Australians are leaders when it comes to recycling. We led with our container deposit legislation, and we will lead with our plastic bag ban as well.

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